Got mine about a month ago at Circuit City Ron. They had plenty then, along with 2 or 3 of the authorized brands. They also stated that they would be glad to have issued a “rain check” if the choice I wanted was not available at the time. I don’t know the particulars of who couldn’t get one in time before the card expired, but these 90 day cards have been available for some time now. Just thought you’d like to know my experience. Oh, for the record … I had absolutely no need for one, as I have satellite, but had a friend who just does the “over the air” reception and I owed him a favor! Just cost me 20 bucks over and above the coupon’s face value, and the sales tax was based on the $20. Personally, I think 3 months is long enough for anyone to locate a unit, but as you pointed out: why have an expiration date to begin with? Yeah, I work for the government, and I stopped asking myself “why” a long time ago! LOL

Hi Don,
Interesting. I guess the short supply issues are not every where. Thanks for sharing your experience.

Everything I’ve seen has been 59.99, 19.99 more than the coupon.

Yes most places will be able to prepurchase or order it.
For example Radioshack, you can order it and it will be shipped direct from warehouse with no shipping charge.

On the expiration, 90 days was decided on as more than reasonable, there are limited funds for this, and will likely run out before February 2009. Expired ones basically go back into the pool, so more people who will actually use it can. I’ve seen some people say they were going to order the coupon for no real reason, having cable, satellite or all high definition sets already

Hi Kevin,
“I’ve seen some people say they were going to order the coupon for no real reason, having cable, satellite or all high definition sets already.”

Good point! Makes one wonder how many people are reselling their coupons at a discount?

And for people buying coupons, is broadcast tv in your area so good, that you have more than 2 TVs on antenna, and don’t have satellite or cable and/or HD on at least one of them?

Otherwise, why buy what you can get free?

If someone’s thinking of selling them, think about that, and the fact that once the coupons are gone and expired, prices will likely go down to 39.99, and a couple months after the transition, even lower as clearance.

Then they will be like trying to find a standalone VCR now. If you do find one, it has no tuner.

Uh - just a common sense comment here: If the coupons aren’t USED, then they don’t cost the government money! With one exception - mailing them - now, here’s the question - is the $1.5 billion what it costs to mail them, the total value of all the coupons, or both??? Based on what you posted, that $1.5 billion is NOT the cost of mailing them out.

Second point - two coupons, at $40 each, means $80 per family. A TV costs a LOT more, esp. one that is capable of receiving HD signals! Like, say, a couple to several hundred - so if you bought one TV per family that needed the coupons, it would COST A LOT MORE than the $1.5 Billion that is being spent on giving out coupons - and again, that $1.5 Billion figure is only if EVERY coupon is used.

I saw a study once from a news source (NBC, or maybe CBS) that showed that of all the coupons (and actually gift cards that everyone is fond of giving) out there, only about 20% are EVER redeemed. Companies can afford to issue coupons because they know most of them will never be used.

The same goes for the U.S. Government - instead of mailing checks out and saying “This is for you to use to purchase two converter boxes” (and then the people the mail them out too just spend it on whatever), they got smart, issued coupons, and that’s it, end of story. Those people who actually use them, will be SOL next year when February hits, and they’ve been sitting on them claiming “OH, I can’t use MY coupon because there are no converters available! - poor me - you need to help me… ” I think they should expire, maybe not in 90 days, but certainly in 180 or so. Anyone who’s too damned lazy to go and actively find the converters (and they are available by the way) deserves to lose out.

We use rabbit ears for our TV when we watch it and ordered the coupons. We then kept meaning to pick up a box, but it wasn’t a priority. The coupons are now expired (just barely, but still). I personally feel that if they expire and we can’t watch TV we haven’t really lost anything. I also think 90 days is a little short, but that’s mostly my opinion. Most of our media viewing is either online or on DVD. The TV is used mostly for that purpose or for playing console games. I question whether we really need to bother with a digital converter, though I’m sure we’ll end up buying one eventually.

This was not something the government needed to issue to people in the first place. It’s not like TV is a necessity for life. It’s convenient, but you can go about your daily business perfectly fine without watching television. Some people even argue that you do better without it in the long run.

Thanks for stopping by everyone and for sharing your thoughts.

1,500,000,000/40=37,500,000 boxes
105,480,101 households in the US(2000)
37,500,000/105,480,101=0.3555 boxes per households, or 35.5 per 100
no idea what the percentage of households is that use antennas, but basically, assuming the 1.5b was 100% for coupons, coupons would be given until 37.5m are redeemed or outstanding but not expired, the expire cycle has to be pretty short, or they’s run out, then months later a bunch expire, and it’s too late to reissue. 180 days is 6 months, and there’s only 8 months from now to the transition

My mother requested the “coupons” for herself, and by the time she got them, there was less than 30 days before they expire. Now it’s my job to find her two good boxes in about one week…

We ordered our “coupons” quite early in the program (like the first week they were offered ),as did our neighbor, We got ours and promptly used the 2 of them at Walmart, now that still leaves us with having to get 2 more converters for the kid’s TVs. My neighbor is still waiting to get their “coupons”. We checked the web site for them and it said something to the effect that he should have received them already. He can’t reorder to get any, If his were to show up now I think they would have passed their expiration date looks like he is going to have to fork out the $50 each for his 2 TV,s, that is if he wants to watch TV after next Feb. Cable and Sat both cost more then he can afford (not to mention the deposits required). I think I shall wait and see if what Kevin, was predicting, about the prices going way down after next Feb, actually comes about, then I’ll get the boxes for the kids. Then till I do get them, the kids can either watch in the front room or watch their DVDs, videos, or play their video games in their rooms.

WELL, I DID LIKE OTHERS DID AND GOT THE CUPONS EARLY. THEY HAVE SINCED EXPIRED, AND WE CANNOT REPLACE THEM. WE DID PURCHASE A DIGITAL TV, BUT I HAD A CALL THE OTHER DAY, AND THE GUY SAID THAT EVEN W/ OUR DIGITAL, WE MAY NEED SOME OTHER HOOK - UP, CAUSE IT IS GOING TO BE FUZZY OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT. I SAID WELL I GUESS WE’LL SEE WHAT HAPPENS, AND IF WE EVEN WANT TO WATCH TV W/ ALL THE CRUD THEY SHOW NOW A DAYS; WE ARE PROBABY BETTER W/OUT IT!